Medicine Reference Libraries
Flavivirus is a genus of the family Flaviviridae. This genus includes the West Nile Virus, Dengue Virus, Tick-borne Encephalitis virus, yellow fever virus, and quite a few others. Flaviviruses get their name from the yellow fever virus. Flavus means yellow in Latin. Yellow fever was named because if caused yellow jaundice in victims. Mosquitoes and ticks transmit these viruses by biting...
Feline viral rhinotracheitis (FVR), caused by feline herpesvirus 1, is an upper respiratory infection of cats. It can also be referred to as feline influenza or feline coryza. FVR causes one-half of respiratory disease in cats. Feline calicivirus is another of the most common diseases to cause respiratory infection in cats. It is very contagious and can cause major problems including death...
Feline leukemia virus (FeLV), a retrovirus that infects cats, is transmitted between infected cats through saliva and nasal secretions. If the cat's immune system does not take care of the disease then it can be lethal due to it being a cancer of blood cells called lymphocytes. Symptoms can vary from loss of appetite, to poor coat condition, infections of the skin, bladder and respiratory...
Feline calicivirus (FCV), in the Caliciviridae family, is one of two important viral causes of respiratory infection in cats. FCV can be isolated from around 50 percent of cats with upper respiratory infection. The various strains of FCV vary in virulence. Since it is an RNA virus it has a high elasticity of its genome which makes it more adaptable to environmental pressures. This causes...
Equine Infectious Anemia, also called swamp fever, transmitted by bloodsucking insects infects horses and is cause by a retrovirus. It is endemic in the Americas, parts of Europe, the Middle and Far East, Russia, and South Africa. It is a lentivirus, similar to HIV. EIA can be transmitted through blood, saliva, milk, and bodily secretion. Normally transmission comes from biting flies like the...
Eastern equine encephalitis virus (EEE), also called sleeping sickness or Triple E, is a zoonotic alphavirus and arbovirus that exists in the Americas and the Caribbean. It was first seen in Massachusetts in 1831 when 75 horses died of encephalitic illness. It is often associated with coastal plains. EEE was first isolated from the brain of an infected horse in 1933. In 1938 the first human...
The Epstein-Barr virus (EBV), or human herpesvirus 4, is part of the herpes family and causes cancer. It is one of the most common viruses in humans and is correlated to the pathogenesis of multiple autoimmune diseases including rheumatoid arthritis, systemic lupus, dermatomyositis, and multiple sclerosis. It can also cause several lymphoproliferative disorders and cancers. Most people gain...
The BK virus, a member of the polyomavirus family, has no major consequences of infected except with those that are immunocomprimised or immunosuppressed. The virus was first isolated in 1971 from the urine sample of a renal transplant patient whose initials were B.K. Similar in genome sequences to the JCV virus they are most easily identified and differentiated from each other through...
The B19 virus, or parvovirus, was the first found human virus in the parvovirus family. It causes a childhood rash called fifth disease also commonly called slapped cheek syndrome. Yvonne Cossart discovered it by chance in 1975. It gained its name, B19, due to the labeled Petri dishes it was found in. The virus is classified as erythrovirus due to its capability to invade red blood cell...
Human parainfluenza viruses, belonging to the paramyxovirus family, are a group of four distinct serotypes of enveloped single-stranded RNA viruses. They are the second most common cause of lower respiratory tract infection in younger children. Many times the host has repeat infections throughout life with symptoms that may include upper respiratory tract illness or more commonly, a cold...
